OC Media

World Down Syndrome Day in Tbilisi’s Rike Park (Luka Pertaia/ OC Media)

World Down Syndrome Day was marked with several events and a campaign to raise awareness of the rights of people with Down syndrome on 21 March in Georgia. Stigma, stereo­types, and low levels of awareness about the issue remain widely visible in the country. [Read more…]

People with dis­abil­i­ties in Georgia are often locked away either at home or in large-scale insti­tu­tions, prevented from living their lives to the fullest. Community based housing should be the norm, offering them the oppor­tu­ni­ty to live inde­pen­dent­ly and be included in the society.[Read more…]

Women in Georgia very often lack a voice of their own. Their opinions, feelings, dreams, aspi­ra­tions, and achieve­ments can be conveyed by others, often the men around them. The Women in Georgiaproject gives a voice to these women, allowing them to tell their own stories — in their own words. The project collected 150 distinct stories from women through­out the country. OC Media brings you a selection of these stories, trans­lat­ed into English and Russian. Below, in her own words,Salome Mikadze.[Read more…]

Georgian super­mar­ket chain Fresco was inves­ti­gat­ed by the the Ministry of Labour, Health and Social Affairs of Georgia for alleged exploita­tion and forced labour, but ‘the alle­ga­tions were not confirmed by any of Fresco’s employees’, the Minister of Labour said on 9 February.[Read more…]

The Georgian Public Broad­cast­er (GPB) has decided to tem­porar­i­ly shut down all of its talk-shows in order to ‘fight the crisis’ and remo­bilise financing to renew the broad­cast­er. Among the closed talk shows will be Realuri Sivrtse (Real Space); activists and jour­nal­ists, as well as the sows audience, have opposed the move to shut down the show.[Read more…]

A new poll reveals that Georgians are most anxious about economic issues and the top issue remains to be jobs, while very few of them believe that their household is now better-off than it was in 2012, when the gov­ern­ment changed. The poll also revealed declining numbers of Georgians sup­port­ing EU and NATO mem­ber­ship, though the overall number remains high.[Read more…]